Lymes disease is caused by a tick-borne spirochete. Early symptoms of Lymes disease which appear in weeks to months following initial infection include meningitis, facial palsy and migratory muscular-skeletal pain. Later appearing symptoms which can occur months to years after initial infection include chronic arthritis, encephalopathy, polyneuropathopy and leukoencephalitis. The usual therapy for Lymes disease is a 10-20 day course of antibiotics which must be implemented during the early stages of infection in order to have any appreciable expectation of success. However, even with early intervention, in a small percentage of patients the antibiotic therapy will be ineffective. This is particularly so if the spirochete has spread to the patient's nervous system.
Untreated patients, patients who did not receive antibiotic therapy early enough, or the small percentage of patients who did receive antibiotic therapy but nevertheless failed to respond, will generally experience the symptoms noted above as well as disturbances of memory, mood or sleep, axonal polyneuropathy with paresthesias or spinal pain. Typically, patients, particularly initially untreated patients, may also experience large knee effusions. The foregoing conditions associated with Lymes disease generally cannot be alleviated by late intervention with antibiotics.
Fortunately, it has now been discovered that untreated symptomatic patients as well as patients who received antibiotic therapy for Lymes disease but failed to respond, can be effectively treated using the photopheresis methods described below.